Torches and Dust Mites
by petrichorstarlight
Summary: Rose and the Doctor are unwinding in the Tardis after a long day of adventures when the power suddenly goes out. What could have caused it? Will the Doctor and Rose be able to get the Tardis working again? Can be either 9 or 10, whichever you prefer. Just a one-shot drabble I wrote while I've been here at my friend's house. Enjoy!


"Doctor!" Rose hollered. She had just stepped into the shower after a long day of running, and had been _very _much looking forward to a nice, hot, relaxing wind-down to the day. But no sooner had she started the water running than all the lights suddenly shut off, taking the water with them. She stood, surprised, in the now-dark and useless bathroom, water dripping off of her onto a floor she couldn't see. "Doctor!" She hollered again as she felt around for a towel.

Bumps, crashes, and faint shouts of _Rose_ floated through the air while rose furiously toweled off her hair and put on her fresh clothes. She would just have to take them off again once whatever had happened with the Tardis was fixed.

No sooner had she gotten her clothes on all the way than the Doctor ran slap bang into the bathroom door.

"Ow!" came the whine. "Rose, let me in?"

"Hang on, let me find the doorknob." Rose ended up whacking her elbow on it before unlocking it and flinging it open.

"Rose!" the Doctor exclaimed, his hands flying up to her face. How he knew where she was in the dark, Rose had no idea. "Are you all right? Nothing hurt?"

"I'm fine," Rose said. "Just a bit disoriented. I didn't get to wash, you know." The Doctor sighed.

"Sorry. I have no idea what happened. One second I was sitting under the console, the next I'm being spat out onto the jumpseat and there's a very angry Tardis ranting in my head."

"What did you _do_?"

"I didn't do anything! It wasn't my fault, something messed with the Tardis!"

"In all honesty though, how do you know that? You were tinkering around with her."

"Yeah, but it wasn't me! The Tardis is mad, yeah, but she's not angry with me. She's just ranting to me. I can't actually figure out what she's talking about-she's gone and gotten all sorts of past and future events jumbled up, and don't even get me started on how confusing her tenses are."

"So what's the problem then?"

"I dunno. We should probably go find out."

"Yeah, well, that would be great if we could see."

"Oh, sorry!" The Doctor rustled around in a pocket for a few moments before triumphantly flicking on two torches and handing one to Rose. "Mind you," he said as they carefully picked their way through the corridors to the console room, "I don't really need this. Time Lords can find their way around in the dark fairly well without any help. Though some light isn't at all unwelcome. Cheers the place up a bit." He nimbly hopped around all the obstacles.

"Doctor," Rose said as she ran into yet another side table.

"Yes?"

"Shut up."

"Okay." They made it back to the console room without serious incident, and the Doctor carefully helped Rose down under the console. "Mind your head," he warned her."

"Thanks." She looked around as the torch beam caught tangled messes of wires, tubes, and control panels everywhere. "What are we doing down here?"

"Looking for the data core."

"What's the data core?"

"It's like the Tardis' black box. By the way, why on earth do you lot call it a black box if it's never black? It's always orange! Where's the sense in that? If it's going to be orange, and you know it's going to be orange, then why did it get named a _black _box?"

"I don't know, it's never really made sense to me either. But the data core will tell us what happened?"

"Hopefully. If I can just find it-AHA!" He shouted in triumph. "There we go!" He lugged out something that looked like a cross between a laptop and a shoe box. "All right, what have you got?" Rose held the torches up to light up the device for the Doctor. He fiddled and tweaked and finally got the screen to light up. It started rapidly scrolling in what Rose knew to be Gallifreyan. "No, no, that's not what I want. Where are you?" the Doctor muttered to it. He used the sonic to find what he was looking for and then jumped up. "So that's what it was!" he shouted as he dragged Rose along back up to the console.

"What?" Rose asked. The Doctor was maniacally throwing levers, spinning knobs, and dinging bells left and right on the console.

"Electron mites!" he said, grinning at Rose in the faint light from the torches.

"Electron mites? What are electron mites?"

"They're like dust mites, only electrons. And also a bit like nanogenes, only not helpful. They love messing with any power source they can find."

"So that's what happened to the Tardis. They got in somehow and messed up her circuits and whatnot?"

"Exactly. So if I can just send a power surge through the Tardis, I should be able to burn them out of existence. Mites of any kind are nasty little buggers, but electron mites are some of the worst. No way to get rid of them but extermination."

"Okay, but how will you get the power for the surge?" Rose asked. "There's no power to begin with," she said, gesturing to the room at large. The torch's beam swung wildly around the room as she moved.

"Ah, no problem, it'll be fine," the Doctor said. "I always keep power packs handy." He stuck one into a slot on the console as he spoke. "Now, if I amplify it with the sonic and expand the broadcast and surge throughout the entire Tardis-"

An unholy, electric scream exploded throughout every inch of the Tardis, accompanied by a flash of light so bright it could have outshone lightning. Then everything was still for a few moments. The Doctor waited, holding his breath. Suddenly the Tardis flickered back to life, and the air was filled with her gentle hum. The Doctor smiled, relieved. "There we go! All fixed. Didn't I tell you, Rose?"

But when he turned around, Rose wasn't where he'd left her. She was crumpled on the metal grating, a pained expression on her face, even while she was unconscious.

"Oh dear," the Doctor said, guilt evident in his face. "Oh Rose, I'm so sorry. I should have thought. I didn't remember that your human senses wouldn't take kindly to that kind of bombardment." He tenderly picked her up and carried her off into the Tardis. "I can't stand it when you get hurt. My Rose...so strong and beautiful...but still so fragile. Sometimes I forget that." He kissed her forehead tenderly before laying her gently down on her bed. "But," he told her as he pulled the blankets up, "no matter what happens, you'll always be my brave, brilliant, _fantastic_ Rose Tyler."

Several hours later, Rose woke up with still-damp hair, a killer headache, and only vague memories of what had happened just before she'd passed out. But curled up in a chair beside her bed waited a smiling Time Lord and a just-right cup of tea, and really, Rose thought, that was all she really needed.

**Hi! I hope you enjoyed my little drabble. I'm at my friend's house and this just popped into my head, so of course I had to write it. Reviews make me happy, and I have free cookies for you all if you liked it. :) For those of you who didn't like it, I have...more cookies. Because I'm a nice person.**

**Stay awesome!**

**~Starlight**


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